Position in chronology
OIP 092, 0400
About this tablet
An administrative receipt from the Persepolis Fortification archive, the vast bookkeeping system of the Achaemenid Persian empire around 500 BCE, written in Elamite. It records a small quantity of wine drawn from the stores overseen by an official named Huišdana and received by a man named Bagirabba, who used it for a specific obligation or ceremony over a two-month period. Tens of thousands of such slips survive, and together they reveal how the empire of Darius I fed, paid, and provisioned its workers, travelers, and cults in day-to-day detail.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Bagirabba took delivery of a small amount of wine — a few liters, drawn from the supply account managed by Huišdana. He used it up for the abbakannuš connected with the abbamuš, apparently a fixed obligation or ceremonial outlay. The disbursement covers two months on the Persepolis calendar, Karmabataš and Turnabaziš. In effect: a signed-off expense slip from the imperial warehouse, noting who supplied the wine, who received it, what it was spent on, and the accounting period it belongs to.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine3 (and) 2 qa of wine, supplied by (kurmin) Huišdana: Bagirabba received (it); he expended (it as/for) the abbakannuš of the abbamuš. (For) the months Karmabataš and Turnabaziš.
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
3(disz) 2(disz) _qa gesztin-mesz_ kur-min2 hu-isz-da-na-na ba-gi-rab2-ba du-sza2 ab-ba-kan2-nu-isz ab-ba-mu-isz-na hu-ut-tasz-da _iti-mesz_ kar-ma-ba-tasz-na a-ak tur-na-ba-zi2-ia-isz-na-ma
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Achaemenid (547-331 BC)) — OIP 092, 0400. This record has no stored scholarly English translation; the existence of published translations has not been checked; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: OIM L— (PFAP, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA) — from Pārśa (mod. Persepolis) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P383086). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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